Anton Willis grew up with easy access to rivers, lakes and the ocean as well as ample space to store a kayak. Following a move to a smaller San Francisco apartment in 2008, Willis’ fiberglass kayak was forced into storage. After reading an article on new advances in the art and science of origami, he was inspired to sketch ideas for a foldable kayak that would be easy to store and transport. Today, he is the designer of the world’s first foldable kayak, Oru Kayak.

Fast Company Marketing and Autodesk challenged innovative architect and product designer Anton Willis to refine elements of his origami-inspired foldable kayak using Autodesk Fusion 360 3D-CAD software. This photo gallery takes you behind the scenes at Oru Kayak headquarters in San Francisco to see what happened.